Age: 18
Hometown: Blackburn, England. "It’s a small town up north that goes at a very, very slow pace, with lots of grass and little terraced houses and markets and homemade cakes."
Currently: Making a notable West End debut inheriting Jane Horrocks' stage and film role as LV, the painfully shy teenager with the amazing voice in The Rise and Fall of Little Voice. Jim Cartwright's 1992 play, subsequently filmed by the director Mark Herman, is in revival at the Vaudeville Theatre. Vickers plays the title role of the timid adolescent who sits upstairs in her bedroom, taking solace in her records, while her brassy mother, Mari (Lesley Sharp), carries on with men, drinking and loudly cavorting. Horrocks was well into her 20s when she first played LV under Sam Mendes' direction, so Vickers is much more age-appropriate.
Seizing the Spotlight: Little Voice is about a reluctant celebrity: a young girl thrown into the spotlight because of a freakish gift for mimicry that enables her to sing on cue exactly like Judy Garland, Dusty Springfield and Shirley Bassey, to name just a few. Her singular talent soon attracts the attentions of one of Mari's conquests, an agent of dubious repute called Ray Say (Marc Warren). Does Vickers share LV's reticence, having come to attention herself as a 2008 semi-finalist on TV's X Factor [the U.K.'s popular talent competition that's similar to American Idol]? "It's a lot different," says Vickers, comparing her sudden grab for attention with LV's. "I knew that was part of the deal, and that if I was going to do X Factor at all, that the spotlight comes along with it, even if I truly hated having my private life all over the papers. LV's dream was never to be on the stage. She does what she does as a tribute to her [absent] father."
Silence is Golden—Maybe: As LV, Vickers says very little, leaving Sharp's rampaging Mari to tear about the stage in the part that brought Brenda Blethyn her second Oscar nod. "That's hard," admits Vickers of her need to stay mostly silent except for when LV sings. "I'm a very talkative person, and I express myself naturally with a lot of words and a lot of hand gestures, so when I first started [the play], it was hard to find that energy. What I find is that I just have to go into being me and being present: Mari is such a loud character, but I am obviously there, as well."
Sing Out, LV: "I didn't know I could do all those voices," Vickers says of the practical demands of the role, which require LV to channel a host of legendary singers. "Judy [Garland] and Julie [Andrews] have been the hardest," she explains, having watched countless YouTube videos and steeped herself in recordings in preparation for the task at hand. "Shirley [Bassey] was very easy, at least for someone like me who mimics anyway." At the end of the show, LV sings an original song in her own voice, written by Take That's Mark Owen. "That's my own song," says a clearly exultant Vickers, who thinks the ending bodes well for her painfully indrawn character. "LV is going to be someone some day. She loves her mum but at the same time, she moves away and gets on with life."
Making Music: Vickers speaks of herself as someone who "has had a huge door opened up for me, especially since I have so much still to learn." But don't look for her to be doing the audition rounds of London musicals once her four-month run in this is finished. Shows like Wicked, she says, are "great to watch but I don't know if I could do them. I'm not made for that, really. I love going to musicals but like creating my own music," which explains why she has embarked on a debut album, due out in February. As for the obvious contrast between the X Factor arena tour, which took her to venues seating 10,000, and the comparative intimacy of a West End playhouse, "I love the intimacy we have every night [at the Vaudeville] I really do. But in the end, it's just the same buzz."